Sector: service
D Worx is a top player for expertise and services in payroll, HR and tax & legal matters within Belgium and across Europe. One of its business applications, X-Tend, a tool that supports payroll and HR related processes and which was developed in Microsoft Dynamics AX 2009, contained legacy functionalities and required an important upgrade.
As Microsoft is releasing Microsoft Dynamics AX 2015, SD Worx decided to align its current X-Tend solution to this new standard, in order to support further growth of the solution and avoid potential customer attrition due to not being compatible with the latest Microsoft Dynamics AX version. The new solution would benefit from the most recent standard Microsoft Dynamics AX solution elements enriched with relevant payroll and HR functionalities. It would reduce the maintenance costs structurally and would introduce new sales by offering a state-of-the-art payroll and HR solution. Here is the story of how SD Worx prepared for alignment, and how Business Consulting helped.
This business context has been reflected in a project business case, that exposed the many contextual elements that influence the long-term results of this investment. It included the calculated rough-cut benefit and cost assessment, listed the qualitative benefits and rated them for four different scenarios (from a pure technical upgrade to a from-scratch functional upgrade) with pros and cons. The project owner requested management approval for the outcome of the business case, and to select the preferred scenario.
As a direct outcome of the business case, SD Worx decided to detail the business and product requirements. Business Consulting was called upon to facilitate this crucial phase. They deployed an approach that successfully led to the agreed requirements.
A team of internal consultants was selected and coached to work according to SD Worx standards, combining the System Context Diagram (SCD), the Volere methodology and previous experience. These methodologies helped defining detailed business and software requirements, and business rules. Each team member focused on a specific set of business requirements. Being physically in the same room to perform this job ensured swift peer-to-peer validations and methodology alignment.
In several workshops, the methodology got more refined, mainly to have a more common approach on nomenclature and definitions. Again peer-to-peer reviews proved very valuable. Extra assessments were done by key users outside the project team and by customer user groups.
Additionally, the product was assessed from the end user perspective for which so called ‘use cases’ were designed. These use cases will support the functional and technical consultants during the future design and build of the solution. Later, once the application is built, the same use cases will act as backbone for testing the application’s performance.
Once a sharp view on what the solution should look like and how it should support SD Worx’ business, the vendor selection process was initiated.
Vendors were informed about the project business objectives, the solution’s requirements and the selection process. The Request for Proposal (RFP) included a responsibility matrix (SD Worx versus vendor) and the contract framework.
During a six-week proposal phase, Q&A sessions were organized to help vendors improve their proposal. Using a bottom-up voting process the final vendor was selected and recommended to the investment board.
The board approved the investment proposal and the business case. Negotiations with the selected vendor resulted in a signed contract in less than two weeks.
Another two weeks later a motivated, eager, diverse and international team kicked off.
This assignment is another example of Business Consulting continuing to carry out its mission: listening to clients, acquiring a deep understanding of their needs and opportunities and driving change in the core of clients’ business.
Read more about SD Worx on www.sdworx.com.